


the way the world ends

by Dain



Category: Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008) - All Media Types
Genre: Affection, Aftermath of Torture, Angst, Anxiety, Brainwashing, Canon Compliant, Capture, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Fluff and Angst, Friendship, Gen, Grief/Mourning, Hurt No Comfort, Isolation, Literal Sleeping Together, Loss, Memories, Order 66, Platonic Cuddling, Self-Harm, Star Wars: The Clone Wars Season 7, Unhealthy Coping Mechanisms, no happy ending, this is gonna be way more angsty than fluffy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-13
Updated: 2020-09-16
Packaged: 2021-03-06 18:08:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 8,728
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26433145
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dain/pseuds/Dain
Summary: Life on the front lines came with no guarantees. Jesse knew that better than anyone - or he thought he did.
Relationships: CT-5597 | Jesse & CT-6116 | Kix
Comments: 12
Kudos: 37





	1. Chapter 1

When Jesse opened his eyes the room was dark and he was alone.

He couldn’t make anything out in the darkness, but he didn’t need to see in order to know that Kix was gone. It was the sort of thing you just _knew_ after nearly two years of sleeping next to someone.

He didn’t like Kix not being there, didn’t like feeling nothing but empty space when he reached an arm across the bunk, but they were safely aboard the cruiser now, and no alarms were blaring. There wasn’t anything to worry about; there were any number of reasonable explanations for Kix's absence. 

Jesse closed his eyes again and let the quiet sounds of sleeping brothers wash over him as he slowly drifted back to sleep.

He woke again an uncertain amount of time later when the door to the barracks slid open, admitting a slice of dull light from the hallway beyond and one black-clad figure. The door slid shut again before Jesse could catch more than a glimpse of the newcomer, but moments later he heard the sound of approaching footsteps and felt the edge of the bunk bow down under a gentle weight.

“Kix?” he whispered. Even so close he couldn’t say for sure who it was.

“Sorry,” Kix’s voice whispered back. “Didn’t mean to wake you. I had to go to the…” His voice wavered and he cleared his throat, the sound loud and harsh in the quiet barracks. “I had to go to the fresher.”

“Something wrong?”

“No.”

“Another nightmare?”

A pause. Jesse’s heart constricted, and he reached out blindly until his hand collided with what felt like one of Kix’s shoulder blades. Kix leaned back into the touch.

“Yeah,” he said finally. “Just a nightmare.”

Jesse shifted over to the other side of the bunk, away from Kix, and patted the empty space next to him. “Come on.”

The weight on the bunk shifted, moved closer and evened out, and Kix settled in next to him, warm and solid. Jesse pressed a kiss into Kix’s curls - soft rather than fuzzy now that he was growing them out - as Kix wrapped an arm around him, holding him close.

“Get some sleep,” Jesse murmured. “You’ll need it tomorrow.”

Kix mumbled something in vague agreement, and Jesse fell asleep with his cheek nestled in his hair.

* * *

The lights in the barracks turned on automatically and without any of the gentleness of a sunrise. One moment the room was pitch-black and quiet, the next it was full of blinding light and groaning troopers.

Three years after his initial deployment, Jesse was used to getting up and moving before he’d fully woken up. Kix was another story, but Jesse was also well-practiced at shoving him out of the bunk to get him on his feet. 

“How’d you sleep?” Jesse asked as he clambered out of the bunk after him, stifling a yawn behind one hand. Kix was staring sleepily at their footlocker, but looked up when Jesse opened it, revealing two sets of armor.

“Fine,” Kix said. His fingers fumbled on a greave.

“Kix.”

“ _Really_ ,” Kix said. “I only got up the once.”

Jesse’s response was cut off by a familiar shriek. “Streak, leave 37 alone,” he called, barely even glancing in their direction. “Meere, don’t encourage them.”

“Yes, Lieutenant,” a chorus of voices replied. Jesse peered through the bunks to make sure they were actually listening to him; Streak was pulling 37 off of his bunk, Meere stifling giggles nearby. Close enough.

“Shinies,” Jesse said mournfully, returning to the task of armoring up. They’d be landing on a planet called Pirokh later that day, which would mark the beginning of Meere and 37’s first campaign, and Streak’s second. 37 didn’t even have a _name_ yet. “I’m going to ask Rex to stop assigning them to me. They’re too much work.”

“Your fault for getting yourself promoted,” Kix said mildly. 

“I’m not done with you yet,” Jesse said, turning his attention back to Kix and armoring up.

Kix sighed. “I’m fine, Jesse.”

“The nightmares aren’t getting any better, are they?”

“No. But I’ll be fine. There’s nothing wrong with me a cup or two of caf won’t fix, I promise.” He offered Jesse a small smile before pulling his helmet on, obscuring his face.

Jesse put his own helmet on, and Kix wavered for a moment before clasping Jesse’s forearm and dragging him in closer for a clumsy bump of their helmets together. “I’ll see you planetside,” Kix said.

“See you,” Jesse echoed, and watched as Kix wove through the bunks and brothers and out the door.

* * *

Being a lieutenant came with perks, like getting the nicest spot during breaks. Jesse’s and Vaughn’s platoons had spread out inside a ruined building, and the chunk of upturned duracrete he’d claimed was flat on top, in the shade, and big enough for two.

Kix sat down next to him with a heavy thunk of plastoid, ration pack in hand.

“How’s it looking?” Jesse asked.

“Good,” Kix said, ripping into the package with his teeth. “Low casualties so far.”

“Glad it’s not just us,” Jesse said, and Streak raised a ration stick in agreement from where he was seated in the rubble nearby.

“It’s been really quiet,” Meere piped up from next to Streak. His armor was finally looking a little scuffed up. It was sort of cute. “I thought there’d be more action.”

Streak scoffed. “It’s not always like this,” he said. “The clankers usually put up more of a fight.”

“Don’t get complacent,” Jesse warned them. “Our luck could always turn around.”

“Yes, Lieutenant,” Streak said, not nearly as contritely as Jesse would have liked.

“What was your first like?” Meere asked, clicking his shoulder against Streak’s.

“Awful,” Streak said cheerfully. “It was all desert and flat and _hot_. There was no cover at all, and if the clankers weren’t bad enough there were these great big biting bugs the size of your _face_ you had to watch out for.”

“I don’t remember them being quite that large,” Kix said, amused.

“Aw, give him a break,” Jesse said. “They probably looked a lot bigger to him, being so small and all.”

Meere laughed and Streak shoved him, saying, “You’re _younger_ than me!”

Kix sighed as Meere shoved Streak back and the conversation developed into a friendly tussle. “They’re so young,” he murmured, quiet enough that only Jesse was likely to hear.

“Yeah.” As an eight-year-old, Jesse had still had years of training ahead of him before deployment. Now, it was easy to forget that eight hadn’t always been considered old enough to go to war.

Kix frowned down at his rations. “Do you think they’ll see the end of the war?”

Jesse made a face. “I try not to think about it.”

“Do you think…” Kix hesitated.

“What?”

Kix was starting to curl in on himself, his head and shoulders drooping. When he spoke, his voice was barely above a whisper. “Would it be a good thing if they did? If they made it to the end, I mean.”

Jesse frowned. “What do you mean?”

“We don’t know what’s going to happen after the war. What if it gets worse?”

“How could it get _worse?_ ”

Kix wrapped his arms around his middle. “I don’t know.”

“Hey,” Jesse said, reaching over to take Kix’s hand. “Is this what’s been bothering you?”

“No,” Kix said. “Maybe. I don’t know.”

“Don’t you think they deserve a chance at something better?”

“But that’s what I mean.” Kix looked up at Jesse, upset and uncertain. Jesse felt a pinch of worry; nightmares were one thing, most of them had nightmares, but dragging this kind of emotional turmoil into battle wasn’t a good idea. “What if it gets worse, not better? Would you rather give your life for the Republic, doing what you were made for, or…”

“Or what?”

Kix sighed and looked away. “I don’t know.”

Jesse squeezed his hand gently once before letting go. “None of us know what’s going to happen when this is all over, but I think it’s worth trying to see,” he offered.

Kix grimaced and took a bite out of a ration stick rather than replying.

“I’m gonna buy a house,” Streak said suddenly. Jesse had mostly forgotten anyone else was there; Streak and Meere must have stopped fighting at some point and were now watching the two of them, eyes young and bright.

“What?” Jesse asked, nonplussed.

“One of those things civvies live in.”

“I know what a _house_ is,” Jesse said. “How are you going to buy a house?”

“I’ll get a job after the war,” Streak said. “And then I’ll buy a house.”

Was he trying to cheer them up? Jesse decided to play along. “Just so long as you let your platoon live there with you.”

“Of course,” Streak said, affronted. “Houses are too big for just a squad.”

“That’s okay then,” Jesse said. He nudged Kix with his elbow. “You can come, too.”

Kix snorted, but he was smiling, and Jesse warmed at the sight.

“Oh!” Kix said, Jesse almost dropping the remains of his ration pack in surprise at the outburst. “I almost forgot.” He slung his medkit off of his shoulders and into his lap, flipping it open and rummaging through it for a moment. “I picked this up for you,” he said, holding something out to Jesse.

Jesse took it, turning it over in his hands. It was a piece of colored glass, irregular in shape and sharp-edged, a bright arterial red like the paint on Kix’s shoulder. When he held it out into a patch of sunlight it glowed and softened, creating a pool of red on the ground beneath it. “Where’d you find this?” Jesse asked, mesmerized.

“A couple blocks away, on the ground,” Kix said with a vague gesture towards the road. “From a broken window, I think. I thought it might be good for trading.”

“It is,” Jesse agreed warmly. Someone would like the color and the sharp edges, he was sure. They shared a smile and Jesse tucked the shard of glass into one of his ammo pouches, making sure it fell to the side so it wouldn’t get in the way of him reaching for a charge pack. He’d try to remember to stash it in their footlocker back on the cruiser; it should get him a little more paint off the 104th. “Hey,” Jesse said, nudging Kix again, “do you think-”

His comm chimed.

“Break’s over,” Rex’s voice said. “We’re moving out by 1300.”

“Copy that,” Jesse said, disconnecting the call and standing up with a groan. He was getting too old for this.

He offered a hand to Kix and pulled him to his feet. Jesse studied his face in the moment before Kix slipped his helmet back on; Kix’s smile had already faded, though he didn’t look distressed so much as worn down.

Jesse wasn’t sure which he preferred.

* * *

The period in between winning and getting off the planet was arguably better than the period in between losing and getting off the planet, but not by much.

They’d had to march through miles of forest just to make it somewhere the gunships could land to pick them up, and now Jesse was leading his platoon up the side of one of the plateaus that broke up the dense woodlands, head down, lungs burning.

When Jesse finally made it to the top he wanted nothing more than to collapse into the long, yellow grass that grew there, but he made himself stay on his feet so he could watch his platoon finish the climb. There was another group of troopers about halfway up, and more milling about at the foot of the plateau.

A flash of red caught his eye; there was a lone trooper off to the right, far enough away that he only looked to be the size of Jesse’s hand, but the bright red medic’s badge on his shoulder and the patch of blue on his chest were unmistakable.

Jesse raised a hand to wave, hoping to catch his attention, but Kix didn’t look up. After a few more paces he turned, heading deeper into the forest, his bright white armor quickly obscured by trees.

Too bad, but at least they’d see each other back on the ship soon enough.

Jesse cast a glance over his platoon, which had sprawled itself out in the grass, helmets off, some of them lying down with their eyes closed, others sitting up and talking amongst themselves.

It took him just one look to determine where he was needed most, and picked his way through the prone troopers until he was able to sit down next to Meere, who was staring off into the distance, a little removed from the rest.

“Feeling all right?” Jesse asked.

Meere shrugged listlessly.

“Worried about Streak?”

“And 37,” Meere said. “And Rana.”

Three casualties out of an entire platoon was pretty good, but Jesse knew that saying so wouldn’t help. “We’ll find out for sure tomorrow,” he said instead. He’d seen 37 go down, but hadn’t had the chance to check if he was alive or not. Streak and Rana had disappeared; they might have been wounded and picked up by the medics, or they might have been killed. “Worrying doesn’t help them, and it certainly doesn’t help you. If they made it that’s great, and if they didn’t, you’ll find a way to honor them. Okay?”

Meere didn’t respond, and Jesse knocked his vambrace against the kid’s rerebrace. “Okay?”

“Yeah,” Meere said. “Okay.”

It wasn’t a comforting response, but Jesse knew it was the best he would get for now. A trooper’s first battle was usually the hardest, and Meere was afraid he’d lost his friends; with any luck, that stress would get easier to bear with time.

Jesse rolled his shoulders and looked up at the darkening blue sky above them, listening for the familiar deep thrum of an approaching lartie. It hadn’t been a bad campaign, all things considered, but still he was more than ready to leave Pirokh behind.

* * *

Jesse let out a sigh of relief as the spray of hot water hit him, loosening tense muscles and rinsing away dried sweat. Nothing compared to a nice shower after a campaign.

He couldn’t linger, though, and soon enough he was stumbling out of the shower room with the twenty or so other troopers who’d come in with him, all in varying states of dead-eyed exhaustion. He dried off before pulling on a fresh set of blacks from the cubbies lining the wall and strapping on his armor, which felt unusually heavy on him now that the battle rush had faded. It made for a good motivation to get back to barracks so he could take it back off and get some much-needed sleep.

Kix wasn’t there when he arrived. He never knew if he would see Kix after a battle or not; sometimes he made it back with the rest, sometimes he would slip in after lights-out, and sometimes he slept in medical, too tired or too busy to make the trek back to barracks.

The lights were still on for the time being, but that didn’t stop most of the bunks from being filled. Jesse caught a glimpse of Meere a few bunks down, his back to Jesse, shoulders hunched around his ears. It would be a harder night for some than for others, but hopefully rest would do him some good. Jesse’s armor was dropped unceremoniously into the footlocker before he collapsed into the bunk, already half-asleep.

He would have preferred to have Kix there, but he’d see him tomorrow, and he was too tired to care. And they should have some time before the next campaign to talk. Whatever was going on with Kix, Jesse was going to find a way to fix it.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning for self-harm in this chapter.

Jesse was in good spirits as he headed down to medical the next morning. He’d slept well in spite of Kix’s absence, and debriefing with Rex wasn’t for another couple of hours; enough time to relax a little in the mess instead of hurrying through the meal. The gray hallways of the ship were quiet, most troopers in barracks or in the mess, and his footsteps echoed cheerfully in the empty space.

Medical was also quiet. Every inch of it was brightly lit, all whites and grays apart from the occasional splash of paint on armor or flashing lights on medical machinery. The neatly-spaced beds that lined the walls and filled the floor of the main room were mostly unoccupied, which was always nice to see.

It wasn’t comforting, exactly; no one wanted to spend too much time in medical, but there was a certain degree of familiarity in it for Jesse, a familiarity that was tied to more than just injury and death. He’d spent enough time there in full health and good company that he didn’t mind it as much.

Kix was nowhere in sight, but there was a familiar face in a nearby bed. Streak watched him approach, his eyes sleepy with pain medication.

“Hey, soldier,” Jesse said, stopping next to his bed. “It’s good to see you still with us. Meere’s going to be thrilled.”

Streak smiled dazedly. “Just got a little shot,” he said. Wherever his injury was, it wasn’t visible under all the blankets. 

Jesse chuckled. “As long as it was just a little. Make sure you rest up, okay?”

“Mmm,” Streak said, his gaze wandering away from Jesse and towards the ceiling.

“Jesse?”

Jesse turned to find Acth approaching from where he’d been checking in on another patient. “I’m surprised to see you here,” Acth said as he drew up beside Jesse, glancing between him and Streak. “Checking up on the troops?”

“Looking for Kix,” Jesse said. “Is he around?”

Acth visibly faltered. He looked at Streak again and then back at Jesse, his mouth working like he wanted to say something but couldn’t quite make the words come out. 

“Everything okay?” Jesse asked uncertainly.

Acth took a breath and stepped forward, placing a hand on Jesse’s shoulder. Through plastoid it was a dead weight rather than a reassuring pressure. “I’m sorry, Jesse,” Acth said. “I assumed you knew. Kix didn’t make it back yesterday.”

“He wasn’t here?” He certainly hadn’t been in barracks. Where else would he have slept?

“No one’s seen him since that last skirmish.” Acth’s voice was unbearably gentle. “I reported him as MIA.”

“What?” Jesse took a step back. Acth’s hand slipped off of his shoulder. “That’s - _I_ saw him. After. When we were waiting for pickup.” He tried to parse Acth’s words, to fit them together in a way that made sense, but they kept unraveling, just out of reach. Jesse had seen him. He’d been _fine_.

Acth was watching him steadily. “You’re sure it was him?”

“Yes,” Jesse said, but he was struck by a surge of doubt. _Was_ he sure? He’d seen the medic badge - he knew what Kix’s armor looked like - but he’d been so far away. Could he have made a mistake? Maybe the red he’d seen had been blood, maybe the blue on the chest had just been a shadow…

“Jesse,” Acth said, breaking through his thoughts, “I don’t know what to tell you. All I can say is no one’s seen him since we left Pirokh.”

“Right,” Jesse said, backing further away. The lights were hurting his eyes, making them burn. His chest hurt. “Right, I’ll just - I - yeah.”

He turned on his heel, overwhelmed by the need to be somewhere, anywhere, else. Kix wasn’t - Kix wasn’t in medical. Jesse didn’t need to be there anymore. Kix wasn’t…he…

“Take care of yourself,” Acth called as he left. Jesse didn’t respond.

* * *

Jesse stopped in front of a door and just stood there, unsure where he was or how he’d gotten there. He’d left medical and then - then he’d started walking, probably. And ended up here.

Someone brushed past him and opened the door, and beyond it was - the mess. Right. He’d planned on coming here with Kix, but that was - that wasn’t - Kix wasn’t there.

Kix wasn’t-

He started walking again.

At some point, a minute or an hour or a day later, he remembered the comm on his wrist. He typed in Kix’s comm code and thought, maybe-

Static.

Not the beeping of a call waiting to be picked up or the harsh buzz of a rejected call. Just static.

Jesse shut his comm off with trembling fingers.

Something was rushing in his ears. The hallways of the cruiser passed by, almost as if he were standing still and they were moving around him.

This time, when he ended up in front of a door, he opened it. The room beyond was dimly lit and empty; it was a small training room, one designed for individual or maybe squad use. A wrestling mat filled the right half the room, and there was a rack of weights and a bench off to the left, as well as a punching bag. Jesse made a beeline for the bag.

He should have stopped, stripped out of his gauntlets and wrapped his hands, but he was afraid that if he lost his momentum he’d lose his grip as well. He just needed to distract himself for a little while.

And besides, even if he hurt his hands, no one would bother him about it later because Kix-

Jesse hit the bag, and it hurt, and it didn’t make him feel any more stable but it did feel good to hurt. He hit it again, and again, and again, falling into a rhythm of four beats, 1-2-3-4, 1-2-3-4.

He’d seen Kix after the action had finished.

1-2-3-4.

Maybe he’d been wrong.

1-2-3-4.

Maybe that hadn’t been Kix.

1-2-3-4.

No. He knew it had been Kix.

1-2-3-4.

He knew Kix’s armor like he knew his own.

1-2-3-4.

Where else could Kix be?

1-2-3-4.

Maybe there had been a mistake.

1-2-3-4.

How?

1-2-3-4.

Kix was gone.

1-2-3-4.

No.

1-2-3-4.

Jesse had seen him.

1-2-3-4.

Jesse had seen him, but no one else had.

1-2-3-4.

What did that mean?

1-2-3-4.

That meant…

1-2-3-4.

That meant…

1-2-3-4.

Jesse had seen him.

1-2-3-4.

He’d seen Kix, but he hadn’t seen Kix get on a lartie.

1-2-3-4.

Kix’s comm code had only given him static.

1-2-3-4.

The obvious explanation was-

Jesse’s comm was beeping, its flashing light bright in the dark room. He answered the call, his heart beating too fast, his hands sore and warm and stiff. Maybe-

“The debrief’s started,” Vaughn said, his voice scratchy and distorted through the comm. “Captain Rex is wondering where you are.”

“Right,” Jesse said, struggling to connect to reality for long enough to understand what Vaughn was saying. Debrief. That was today. Right. “Sorry. I’ll be right up.”

He ended the call.

He found his way to the briefing room without needing to think about it, which was a small mercy. The debrief had already started; too many pairs of eyes were on him as he sat down and took his helmet off, setting it on the table. He tried not to look at any of them too closely.

The exercise had tired him out, his hands pulsing in time with his heartbeat, and trying to focus on what was going on around him was a losing battle. He wasn’t sure if he was ever called upon for an addition to the conversation. It didn’t feel entirely real, like he was dreaming. Maybe he was dreaming. That would be a relief.

Maybe he’d wake up and Kix would still be gone.

Jesse clenched his hands into fists under the table and let the sharp pain in his knuckles overpower everything else. He was tired. He was hurting. He didn’t want to be awake.

He didn’t notice when Rex dismissed them, but he did notice the sudden movement and clamor of everyone else standing up around him. He followed a moment later; a hand landed briefly on his shoulder before vanishing again, but he didn’t see who it belonged to.

“Lieutenant Jesse,” Rex said, just as Jesse was getting ready to follow the other lieutenants out of the room. “Can I have a word?”

Jesse obediently stayed put by his seat. He didn’t want to be there, with Rex looking at him, but he didn’t have a reason to get out of it, either. And it wasn’t as if there was anywhere else he wanted to be.

Rex approached him when the others had filtered out of the room, coming to a stop a few feet from him, just out of reach.

“I’m sorry for being late, sir,” Jesse said, his eyes fixed on a point just to the left of Rex’s head. “It won’t happen again.” The words were automatic, scripted, void of meaning.

“I heard about Kix,” Rex said, brushing past Jesse’s apology and going right for the jugular. “How are you holding up?”

“I just found out this morning,” Jesse said. “I have no idea.”

“I have to ask,” Rex said. “Are you going to be able to handle this?”

It took Jesse a moment to respond, but Rex was patient as he swallowed, as he breathed. “Yes, sir,” he said finally. The words grated on his aching throat like sandpaper.

“I need you to be honest with me, Jesse.”

“I am, sir.”

“This is how we lose troopers.”

“I know.” Jesse had seen it before. Everyone reacted to grief differently. Some retreated, some broke down, some got angry. Some of them worked past it, others didn’t.

“All right,” Rex said. “I trust you. Tell me if anything changes.”

Jesse nodded curtly, and Rex stepped past him and out of the room. Jesse wanted nothing more than to curl up on the floor for a while, but he was pretty sure he had an assignment that afternoon, and he didn’t need to be late to anything else. He hadn’t eaten yet, either, but the thought of going to the mess made his gut churn.

He scooped his helmet off the table and shoved it down over his face. He understood why Rex was worried, but he hadn’t made it this far into the war by being sloppy. He could do his job. He just needed time.

* * *

Jesse stripped off his gloves and grimaced at the sight of his bruised, bloody knuckles. There were red-brown tracks running down his hands, and when he flexed his fingers he saw blood beading at the edges of the scabs.

He’d received a casualty report on his datapad after the debrief. He’d already known that Streak was injured, but they’d lost Rana and 37. He couldn’t quite remember if the numbness he felt in response to that news was normal or not.

He didn’t recognize anyone in the showers and no one commented on his busted-up hands, which suited him just fine. He cleaned up quickly, scrubbing as much of the blood off as he could without scrubbing the scabs off as well, and beat a hasty retreat to the fresher.

He selected a razor from the rack and clicked it on, its low hum helping him block out the sounds of brothers nearby. He hadn’t shaved since before Pirokh, and he was eager to get rid of the dark stubble coating his scalp. He dragged the razor along his skin and an image rose, unbidden, of Kix sitting cross-legged in between rows of bunks, Hardcase kneeling behind him, knife in hand, tongue poking out of his mouth as he carefully shaved Kix’s stripes and lightning bolts back down to skin.

Shaving with a knife had been stupid, but razors couldn’t get the fine detailing Kix had wanted. Jesse had taken over maintaining Kix’s hair after Umbara, and months later Kix had started growing it out, claiming it took too much time. Jesse had wondered if he’d ever go back to shaving, maybe once the war was over, but he’d never asked and now-

Jesse fumbled the razor and clattered into the sink below. He rested his still-sore hands on the counter and leaning over them, squeezing his eyes shut, trying to get a grip on himself.

After the debriefing he’d managed to get through the day mostly because he’d made sure he was too busy to think. But Kix was always in the back of his mind, always _there_ , and now he was clawing his way to the front, and Jesse was standing in the middle of a shared fresher on the brink of an emotional breakdown.

_Breathe_ , he reminded himself. _Breathe_. He’d survived loss before. He’d had friends to share it with before, though, and he felt now like he was running fresh out of those, but he’d survived. He could survive it again, even if it felt like his chest was collapsing and the thought of continuing on was unbearable.

_Breathe._

_Breathe._

_Breathe._

His hands hurt. Okay. That was something real. His hands hurt, he was fine, he just had to finish shaving and go to bed and fall asleep.

He opened his eyes. His reflection looked like shit, but he didn’t think about that. He’d nicked himself with the razor earlier; there was a tiny line of blood running down the side of his head that he wiped away.

He rushed through the rest of shaving, nicking himself again and probably missing some stubble in the back, but he didn’t care. He finished and rinsed his head off and left, rhythmically clenching and unclenching his hands to make sure he stayed distracted. He just needed to survive this.

He stripped his armor off back in barracks and dumped it carelessly into the footlocker, which looked emptier than usual, but he didn’t think about it. He climbed into his bunk, alone, and didn’t think about it. He felt cold and vulnerable and his heart was beating too fast but _he wasn’t thinking about it_.

The lights turned off with a click, and he struggled to breathe.

“Fuck,” he whispered, rolling over onto his belly and smashing his face into the pillow. “ _Fuck_.” He was lying perfectly still and the world was moving much too fast around him. He instinctively reached an arm out across the bunk, and the empty space there burned like a blaster bolt to the heart.

He couldn’t breathe.

He rolled onto his side, his back to the empty space next to him, and clasped his hands together, fingers digging painfully into his knuckles. It didn’t help. He was alone, and that was impossible to forget curled up by himself in a bunk that felt huge and cold and empty. He was exhausted and he needed to sleep but he couldn’t stop thinking about the empty space at his back.

He needed to sleep. Kix said - Kix used to say that sleep was just as important as food or water or not stepping on a landmine, that if you forced yourself beyond your limits too often you’d end up in medical. Kix _used_ to say that because-

Jesse let out a shaky breath. His eyes burned. He wanted Kix there with him. It was a childish, immature thought, but he couldn’t help it. He wanted so badly that every bit of him ached, right down to his marrow. There was no one there to hold him, to anchor him, to run a comforting hand over his scalp. He was alone.

Maybe he’d lied to Rex. Maybe he wasn’t going to be able to handle this. It was bewilderingly difficult to get a grip on himself; hadn’t he known, even on Kamino, that this would happen? Hadn’t he known that war was loss?

When he finally fell asleep it was with tears on his cheeks, the ache in his throat and the pounding of his heart no longer enough to keep him awake.

* * *

Jesse kept himself as busy as possible in the days following Pirokh and avoided everyone he knew as much as possible. At mealtimes that meant he was either shoveling his food down as quickly as he could or skipping altogether; he told himself it wasn’t that big of a deal to be missing meals while not in the field, and he almost believed it.

There wasn’t anyone around to tell him otherwise, at least.

But today the tradeoff of having to sit in the mess to get some nutrients in him seemed like it would be worth it, and the thought of eating didn’t make him feel queasy. He grabbed a tray and found an empty table to sit down at, intending to finish the meal as quickly as possible and get out of there. He didn’t have an assignment, but he’d be able to find something to do; he’d been getting good at that lately.

He was only a couple of nutrient rectangles into his meal when someone sat down on the other side of the table, one space over from the seat directly in front of him. Jesse glanced up and found Vaughn, setting his helmet down on the table next to him.

Jesse glanced around the room. There were still open tables around, and by the looks of Vaughn’s tray he’d already started eating. Fuck. Jesse liked Vaughn, but he didn’t want to have this conversation, whatever it was going to be. He popped another rectangle into his mouth. Maybe he could finish before it started.

They ate in silence for another couple of rectangles before Vaughn said, “Haven’t seen you around lately.”

“Been busy.”

“Sure,” Vaughn said. Jesse kept eating. The sooner he finished the sooner he’d have an excuse to leave.

It wasn’t about Vaughn, except that he’d probably volunteered to be the one to do this. Jesse wondered who’d been talking about him - the other lieutenants? Rex?

Probably the other lieutenants. Rex would only do this if he were really, really worried, and even then he would probably do it himself rather than siccing Vaughn on him.

“Look,” Vaughn said finally, “I know you don’t want to talk about, uh, Pirokh-”

“I don’t,” Jesse said.

“And that’s fine!” Vaughn said hurriedly. “But you’ve been isolating yourself. We’re worried, that’s all.”

The thing was, Jesse knew they had cause to. He knew social contact was important to keep him on top of his game, as was rest. But every day now felt like navigating a minefield, where one stray thought could send him tumbling down into grief, and if protecting himself from that meant that he was a less effective soldier, well, so be it.

“We’re just looking out for you,” Vaughn said when Jesse didn’t say anything more.

Jesse couldn’t think of a good response to that, so he didn’t give one, and just kept eating. He was halfway done, so close to getting out of there.

Vaughn took the hint and didn’t say anything more throughout the rest of the meal, which Jesse finished in record time. It wasn’t actually that bad, having Vaughn there, as long as he wasn’t saying anything. Some brothers liked to eat alone, but Jesse wasn’t one of them. He usually sat with whoever else was there: other lieutenants, troopers he knew, sometimes members of his platoon. Hardcase, back in the day. Kix.

Jesse squeezed his eyes shut, but only for a moment. He breathed in through his nose, out through his mouth, and took another bite. He focused on the texture, the flavor, even if it wasn’t much. He let the sounds of the mess wash over him.

He just had to not think about it.

Jesse finally swallowed his last bite and stood up from the table, desperate to get out of the mess. Before he could get out of earshot, though, Vaughn said, “See you around?”

Jesse half-turned back to the table. “Yeah.” He hesitated. “And - thanks.”

He didn’t stick around long enough to hear if Vaughn said anything in reply.

* * *

It took Jesse a solid two weeks to stop expecting Kix to show up sheepishly explaining where he’d been, for him to stop waking up in the middle of the night wondering where Kix had gone before it hit him all over again.

They were just a few days away from Yerbana, and Jesse had allowed himself a moment of quiet in order to clean his armor, getting as much encrusted dirt off of it as he could while not scratching off too much of the paint. His armor was disassembled and all spread out on the bunk in front of him as he went through it methodically, piece by piece.

The door slid open and Jesse paused, rag in hand, to watch Streak enter the room. He must have just been released; Jesse hadn’t gone to see him since that first day, but Meere had visited him regularly and had been keeping Jesse up-to-date on his recovery.

Jesse nodded to Streak when their eyes met, but Streak wasn’t looking for him; he nodded back, but his attention was easily diverted by Meere barreling into him, nearly knocking him over in his enthusiasm.

“Hey, shiny,” Streak said, grinning and wrangling Meere into a headlock. “Calm down, you just saw me yesterday.”

Jesse blinked forcefully and turned back to his armor. There was a little bit of stubborn dirt he was having trouble loosening up, and he poured all of his attention into scrubbing at it.

He still couldn’t help listening to Streak and Meere as their voices moved deeper into the room, away from the door.

“Next time I’ll leave you in there alone,” Meere retorted, and then squawked in protest as Streak did something Jesse wasn’t watching.

“Aw, but you were worried about me,” Streak cooed. There was a scuffling noise, and someone else said, “ _Hey!_ ”

Jesse realized the area he’d been scrubbing was now clean, and looked around for something else; but he’d already gone over the rest, and it was looking pretty spic and span. Lights-out wasn’t for another couple of hours, though, and Jesse wasn’t nearly tired enough to try going to bed early. There had to be something else he could do. Had he checked his ammo levels yet? Maybe he needed a refill.

The first pouch looked good. Had he already done this? The first day or two after Pirokh were a blur, so he checked the other just in case. It was a little emptier than the first; he could probably fit another charge pack or two in there. A walk down to supplies would eat up some time. Except…

Except there was something shining in the ammo pouch, something that definitely wasn’t a charge pack. He dug down, trying to get a grip on it until his fingers slipped and a sharp pain lanced up his finger. He yanked his hand back with a hiss and found blood welling up along the pad of his pointer finger; he stuck it in his mouth and turned the pouch upside-down with his other hand, giving it a shake. Out fell a couple of charge packs and something that glinted red in the barracks lights.

Jesse picked it up. A piece of glass, sharp-edged and bright red. He stared at it, uncomprehending, but then it hit him: Pirokh. Kix had picked this up off the ground and passed it along. Somehow Jesse had forgotten about it entirely.

He tilted the glass and it caught the light, leaving a pool of warm red light beside him on the bunk.

The piece of glass fell out of his fingers, and Jesse stood up and strode out of the room.

There weren’t many places a clone could go on a cruiser to find a little privacy, but there were options. Jesse closed himself in the first storage closet he could find, collapsing to the floor without bothering to turn on the lights. The pain in his finger was already starting to fade. He almost wished it wouldn’t.

He’d been getting better, he really had been, but that piece of glass had reopened wounds he’d been trying so hard to ignore. He was never going to see Kix again, no matter how long he lived. He would never see Kix frown, never hear him laugh, never fall asleep next to him. Anything they might have done or seen together was gone, and there was no getting it back.

He knew there were no guarantees. He’d known that his entire life. He’d just expected them to have more time.

Kix had been upset on Pirokh, worried about the future. Whatever had happened to him, had he still been upset? Had he been afraid? Had it been over quickly, had it hurt?

Jesse wished he could have been there with him, if only so that Kix wouldn’t have been alone.

A sob shook its way out of him, and Jesse curled over himself like some pathetic dying thing. He wanted to stop hurting. He wanted Kix back. He wanted…

It didn’t matter what he wanted. Wanting wouldn’t change anything. Jesse cried, and ached, and wanted, and the ship continued its march through space, perfectly unaware of the man falling to pieces in its belly.


	3. Chapter 3

Jesse had trained for this. He had been taught what to do, what to say, how to smother the fear and the pain as if it did not, could not, matter.

_Everyone breaks eventually. It is your duty not to break._

It had been hell, but now, as impersonal hands stripped armor from his arms and torso, he could only feel grateful for that training. He kept his gaze fixed on Maul, watching dispassionately from a few paces away, and let the sight fill him with anger as he waited for the hands on him to shift, to weaken, so he could twist free and-

Well. He had no illusions that Maul would let him escape. But he’d prefer a quick death over what these people had planned for him.

_Everyone breaks eventually._

His blasters were taken out of their holsters, charge packs removed. One of his captors startled rifling through an ammo pouch and he kicked out at them, hoping to knock them into whoever was holding his arms. The Mandalorian jumped out of the way, Jesse’s leg passing harmlessly through the air, and he barely had it under him again before a fist drove into his gut and left him doubled over and gasping for air.

He was still wheezing when he felt fingers tugging on his other ammo pouch, and he looked up to find one of them stepping back, a familiar piece of red glass pinched between two of their fingers. It looked dull and lifeless in the low light of the tunnels.

They examined it for a moment before snorting and tossing it to the side. It clinked against the duracrete as it bounced, once, twice, three times, and landed in the darkness at the edge of the junction, nearly invisible. Jesse growled low in his throat and thrashed as hard as he could against the hands holding him still, to no avail.

Jesse’s attention turned back to Maul as he approached, the Mandalorians who weren’t holding him falling back. He tried to steady his breathing and chase everything but his designation number and his rank from his mind. He’d trained for this. He knew what to do.

_It is your duty not to break._

_It is your duty._

* * *

It took everything Jesse had to keep himself moving forward. One step, then another, then another. He wanted to fall to his knees again, or perhaps to lie down and sleep, but…

_“Come on, one more step,” Kix said. He was using his medic voice rather than his Kix voice; that more than anything made Jesse worry. “Good. Now one more.”_

Rex caught him with hands on his shoulders as he stumbled to a stop in front of the two Commanders. Maul’s presence burned behind him, the only thing he was sure of; everything else was distant, blurred, unreachable. He managed an apology through numb lips as he waited for the bite of a lightsaber in his spine.

_“How’s the Captain?” Jesse asked._

_“He’ll heal.” Kix had dark circles under his eyes. “Physically, at least. We can’t do much for the rest.”_

Jesse felt marginally safer with the door between him and Maul. He was fairly certain he was still alive, although he guessed that dying might feel like this. He wasn’t certain that anything around him was real except for his pain, and even that was difficult to pin down, everywhere and nowhere. He was tired. He wanted to rest.

“We have a medical station set up not far from here,” Rex said. Jesse had no idea where _here_ was. “Do you think you can make it if I help you?”

Jesse didn’t like the idea of going to a medical station, but he couldn’t remember why. “I’m not hurt,” he tried. The words melted on his tongue and came out all squashed together. He was staring at the floor. He wasn’t sure if that was by design or not.

“Jesse, you can barely stand up.”

_Jesse didn’t like the feeling of painkillers in his system, slowing him down, and he certainly didn’t like being stuck in a cot for days on end, but Kix smiled at him whenever he walked by and that made it easier to bear._

“Kix isn’t there,” Jesse said, finally stumbling on the perfectly rational reason he didn’t want to go to the medical station.

“No, he isn’t,” Rex said quietly.

_“What do you think being dead feels like?”_

_“Does it feel like anything? I figure you’d just be gone. Nothing left to feel.”_

_“General Skywalker said that living things join the Force when they die.”_

_“Oh. I bet it’s quiet, then. Restful.”_

_“I hope so.”_

Time blurred in and out of focus. They were walking, so the conversation with Rex must have ended at some point. Movement was still difficult, even with Rex’s arm around his shoulders, holding him up and encouraging him onwards.

Then he was lying down and it was bright, and what remained of his armor was being stripped off of him. He thought he might have tried to fight back.

He opened his eyes, and someone was kneeling over him, a burst of red paint on their shoulder. His eyesight was blurry. He couldn’t make out anything else.

_“How are you feeling?” the medic asked._

_“Better,” Jesse said. He had more important things on his mind. “How do you get your hair like that?”_

Everything around him was shaking and there was a noise in his ears that seemed familiar, a loud, deep thrum that sat in his bones. Someone was talking nearby, but he couldn’t make out what they were saying. He hoped they weren’t talking to him.

_“We don’t know what’s going to happen after the war. What if it gets worse?”_

Jesse was released from medical late in the night cycle. Nothing was actually _wrong_ with him, as far as anyone could tell, and they needed the beds. He certainly wasn’t about to protest; medical was a haunted place.

If he dreamed after falling asleep back in his own bunk, he was lucky enough not to remember it.

Jesse forced himself out of his comfortable warm spot when the barracks lights snapped on, swinging his legs over the edge of the bunk before he was awake enough to think about it.

Kix wasn’t there, he noticed blearily. Huh.

Actually, there weren’t many people in the room at all; where it was usually full of grumbling and groaning in the mornings, today it was quiet. A lot of the bunks were empty, and most of the sleepers weren’t getting up yet. That was odd. Barracks usually looked like that after a major battle - too many troopers dead or in medical, those that were left allowed to rest a little longer than usual and not eager to get up.

_Mandalore._

Memories coalesced - an ambush - watching his platoon go down one by one, _BreakMeereTailorStreak_ \- invisible fingers at his throat - armor clattering to the floor - something in his mind, stirring up memories, hurting in a way he had no words for, reaching, grasping, _Ahsoka Tano_ , _Ahsoka Tano_ , _Ahsoka Tano_ …

Jesse wasn’t sure how long he spent sitting on the edge of his bunk, bent over his knees, fingers digging into his scalp; but the onslaught of memories did fade, bit by bit, allowing reality to seep back in. He might have been lost for a minute, or an hour, or three. He wasn’t sure if it mattered.

He fell back onto the bunk and closed his eyes. He drifted, weaving in and out of dreams in which Kix was there with him, or Kix was dead, or Maul had Kix and Jesse couldn’t do anything but watch-

After that, he wrestled himself fully to his feet. He might not have an assignment, but lying around in bed wasn’t doing him any good.

He was pleasantly surprised to find his own armor in his footlocker, with all its familiar blues and grays and whites. The tunnels must have been taken and swept at some point after he’d been taken out of the fight, and someone had salvaged it, brought it back.

(He was unsurprised to find that his ammo pouches were entirely empty when he checked. Even if someone had seen the bit of glass, no one would have thought it was his. No one would have thought it might have meant something.)

He armored up, the familiar, comfortable weight reminding him who he was and what he was meant for. He’d broken, but he wasn’t useless. He was still an ARC trooper, a lieutenant, _Jesse_. He could still do his job.

He checked his datapad for news, and - and it should have been a relief, seeing that they’d won, they were heading back to Coruscant with Maul in custody, but all he could think was that he’d prefer to see Maul dead. He didn’t particularly want to be on the same ship as him for any length of time.

No casualty report as of yet. He wasn’t sure he wanted to see his platoon’s numbers, but he had a feeling they’d be getting a lot of fresh blood soon. No assignments up for grabs, either, but Rex usually had something for him if he looked desperate enough. Or was he supposed to ask Vaughn now? He’d start with Rex, which meant starting on the bridge.

The hallways of the ship were just as dull and quiet as the barracks. The only sounds Jesse could hear were distant machinery, his own breathing, and the echo of his footsteps against the walls. It was eerie, and lonely, and he quickened his pace, hoping to avoid spending too much time with himself.

When he finally made it to the lift, there was already a small squad of troopers waiting for it. Jesse debated letting them go up first, but that would mean standing there by himself for who-knew-how-long while he waited, and he wanted to get up to the bridge and get it over with. He stepped into the lift behind the squad; it wasn’t that tight of a fit, but he was uncomfortably aware of them at his back. He tried not to fidget. Being in a small, enclosed space with a handful of brothers wasn’t a problem. Normally it would be a comfort, if anything. He was just - on edge. Nervous, for some reason. It was fine. He’d be fine.

A moment later, none of that mattered anymore.

The order narrowed everything down to a single crystal-clear goal, blotting out all else. The tension in the lift thickened, hands going to blasters, but all of Jesse’s anxiety had fled; it simply didn’t matter anymore. There were larger things at stake than his own comfort or safety.

Luckily they were already heading for the bridge. If the Commander was there, the traitor was likely to be there as well, and Jesse knew from experience how much damage a single Jedi could do against even an entire company of clones. If they were too late - if something happened to the Commander…

No. They’d get there in time.

He wasn’t losing anyone else.

**Author's Note:**

> You can also find me on [Tumblr](https://moonbittern.tumblr.com/)!


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